


Galar Unsolved

by calculatingMinutiae



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon (Main Video Game Series), Pocket Monsters | Pokemon - All Media Types, Pocket Monsters: Sword & Shield | Pokemon Sword & Shield Versions
Genre: Gen, Ghost!Allister, More to be added as they apply
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-18
Updated: 2020-01-18
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:54:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22299652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calculatingMinutiae/pseuds/calculatingMinutiae
Summary: Leon is having a quarter-life crisis... he needs a hobby.So does Raihan, evidently. Gordie is there too.Takes place in or at least adjacent to the TGoGT universe.
Relationships: Beet | Bede & Onion | Allister & Poplar | Opal, Beet | Bede & Poplar | Opal, Dande | Leon & Kibana | Raihan, Makuwa | Gordie & Dande | Leon & Kibana | Raihan, Onion | Allister & Poplar | Opal, Rurina | Nessa/Sonia
Comments: 12
Kudos: 50





	Galar Unsolved

**Author's Note:**

> I was going to disappear into the aether but this idea struck me and will not let go. Shoutouts to my roommate for being rad as heck.

Leon is having a quarter-life crisis.

Ever since Gloria took his place as the strongest trainer in Galar and climbed to the top of the ranks in the battle tower, Leon has absolutely been at a loss for what to do with himself. Even Hop seems to have moved on, mostly, becoming a published academic author at some point while he wasn't looking. He's proud of those kids, he really is, but he can't help the bitter aftertaste on the end of "congratulations"; he was young once too, he thinks at the ripe old age of twenty-six. He was Gloria's age when Rose told him he could rule the world, or at least this part of it, and without one speck of hesitation he's been kicked from the roster. This world takes young talent, puts it through the shredder, and kicks it to the curb the moment it has outgrown the popular mold. There is always someone newer, and younger, more powerful with more pressure hanging over their head just waiting to press down hard enough for the cracks to show.

It makes you glad you can't quite age anymore, really.

You heard about it from Bea, who heard from Nessa who heard from Sonia that Leon has absolutely been _losing his marbles_ (with emphasis, just like that. Evidently Sonia had used a dozen exclamation points, Nessa found it endearing, and Bea showed you verbatim just so the two of you could roll your eyes and laugh together.) Evidently, Leon has taken to traveling the remote parts of the region exclusively to stall the feeling of being a washed-up Has-Been, and _like, totally taken up a habit of dressing by roulette wheel._

He crossed the line when you found him sulking around the Tangle, clearly lost beyond his wits, too obviously spooked to even glance twice at the mushrooms, let alone use them for guidance. Or light. Or not spiraling further and further into the abyss and practically being literally carried away by the moregrem. You had to drag him out by the ear.

Enough is enough. This man needs a hobby.

Granted, though he was your champion for (a Champion Time? You have been awake for three-going-on-four years, and that phrase is embedded in your brain by now), you can't say you really _know him_ very well. Enough to say hello without getting so worked up you feel like you'll either dissolve entirely or puke, but not enough to, say, save him from his slowly crumbling sense of self worth.

No no, you'll ask Opal to do that. You ask Opal, who tells Bede who casually mentions it in the groupchat with Hop. Just when you're tantalizingly close to reaching something resembling the point, the whole project implodes spectacularly. Bede not to Hop, but to _Marnie,_ to Piers to Gordie to Melony to Kabu to Milo to Raihan _,_ the news spreads along the telephone wire that Leon was hunting ghosts in Glimwood Tangle and, _gee, doesn't that sound like a good time?_

Raihan, having felt Leon's absence from every social media platform out there and pretty quickly putting together that the guy hasn't been feeling quite like himself (or, rather, that there is a 'self' for him to be), is the one to text Leon to come to Hammerlocke. It was ostensibly so they can talk and take time to catch up, but that isn't quite what Leon walked into.

*

Leon knocks on the door to Raihan's apartment, if only half-heartedly. He's taken to wearing an amorphous winter coat, particularly because he'd gotten lost on Route Nine looking for the beach not twenty four hours beforehand and has decided not to brave another hailstorm in shorts. The door creaks open. It's strange; the door isn't particularly old, yet it still insists on screaming. _Typical_ , he hazards to guess. He picks his head up, and immediately reaches for the light switch in this dark and dusty living room.

Something brushes his hand.

Leon recoils away from what he doesn't stay still long enough to register as a fishing line tied around a tale leg and onto a penny board that rolls across the floor; the board bumps into a blacklight flashlight, which just so happens to land button-side down and point directly into Leon's pupils as the door slams shut behind him. "Wh— _Raihan?_ "

Two voices sigh from behind the couch in the middle of the living room.

"Told you it wouldn't work, Gordz."

"Then what did you go and help me set it up for, then?!"

"…," Raihan takes a moment, blinking in deep thought. "It's bad enough already that when someone went and beat him, it wasn't me. The last thing we need is you to go killing him with poor construction quality." He flips the switch, illuminating a very messy apartment and approximately one (1) former champion scared a few cities beyond his wits. "I thought we were getting _rid_ of the ghosts."

"Ghosts?" asks Leon, possibly stuck to the inside of the door.

"They haven't shown themselves. Stupid thing is broken, I s'pose," Gordie chimes in, picking up the flashlight and smacking it against his palm a few times. The light flickers, then turns off.

"Or," Raihan folds his hands behind his head, taking the opportunity to stretch, "there aren't any ghosts at all. Look, Leon _, my guy_ , we're staging an intervention."

Leon can only blink in stunned silence as Raihan sits beside Gordie on the couch.

" _I'm_ the one in need of an intervention?!"

"See, that's just the thing," Raihan shrugs, beckoning his rotomphone to flip through screenshots close enough so Leon can see. There's a photograph of Gloria after her iconic match and rise to stardom; of her, Hop, Marnie and Bede posing for the press; of Gloria, Hop, and Piers in Hammerlocke during the Swordward and Shieldbert incident; of all of the gym leaders posing together for the last group photo of the season, crowded around with a conspicuously empty spot center-stage. "It's the off-season, but you've been just about everywhere _except_ around other people. I've seen you, Lee, _you live_ for applause. It just doesn't add up. We're worried about you. Hell _, I'm_ worried about you," he stands, offering Leon a hand to get off of the floor. "Y' didn't even crack a smile in this whole charade."

Leon hesitates. "What, I can't have a holiday without people conspiring I've been possessed by _ghosts?_ " he keeps his hand back, standing up on his own.

" _It seemed sound at the time,_ " Gordie protests, fiddling with the flashlight. "You would have had to be there. We've been marathoning that one Unovan mystery show while you've been away, seemed as good an opportunity as any to try some things out… Here I thought you'd have the humor for it, but of course you'd go and _freak out on me…_."

"What Unovan mystery show?"

"Oh, my dude, how you have been remiss…."

*

"Hmmph. We can do better than that," Leon says after a long moment's silence.

"Can we now?" Raihan perks up a bit, more mischievous than actually doubtful. He still scrolls idly on his phone, even without actually looking at it.

"Yeah, think I've been around the region enough to know that we've got _far_ better stories than some bloke in a Butterfree costume."

"Like?"

"The watchtower? The fae? The _Diglett Mafia_?"

"The Diglett _Wha_ —"

"You can't just _say_ shit like that!" Gordie chimes in from the other end of the couch.

"You honestly believe that there's a _Diglett Mafia,_ " Raihan turns, incredulous.

"Oh, it's real alright." Gordie shrugs, leaning back into the couch cushions. "No doubt about that. Have you _been_ to Stow-on-side in the last. _Ever?_ "

"How dense do you think I am!"

"No, Rai, he's right."

" _Not you too."_

"On my life, sure as Eternatus could blast it out of the sky, the Diglett Mafia is certifiably a Thing." Leon glances over at Raihan, who has started scrolling so quickly the screen takes the form of a Rather Large Smudge. "And if you don't believe it, well… why don't we show you? Gordie, think you could take a video?"

Gordie nods, grinning ear-to-ear. It's just his rotomphone, not a _"real"_ camera _,_ but it seems equally excited by the prospect. "Our time has come."

"Alright, then. Come on, Rai, time to investigate."

**Author's Note:**

> I have about 15 chapter ideas and it only gets sillier from here friends.


End file.
